British Journalism Awards 2022 – winners announced

Press Gazette editor-in-chief and chairman of the judges Dominic Ponsford said the winners provide plenty of “proof that journalism matters, that it does make a difference”.

“It has been a year when hundreds of colleagues have placed themselves in the firing line of Vladimir Putin’s missiles to report on the plight of the people of Ukraine. And in which publications and broadcaster of every political persuasion and none held the executive branch of UK Government to account so effectively that a prime minister was forced to resign.”

British Journalism Awards 2022 winners:

SOCIAL AFFAIRS, DIVERSITY & INCLUSION JOURNALISM

Chi Chi Izundu, Ruth Evans, Alexandra Topping and Aamna Mohdin – BBC News and The Guardian

• Tim Westwood: Abuse of Power

The judges said: “This was brave journalism which involved journalists shining a light on their own employer. It involved painstaking work which gave a voice to victims.”

David Jones – Daily Mail

• No words of regret or remorse. From her en-suite prison cell with woodland view, baby Star’s sadistic murderer tells the Mail: ‘I’m going to appeal’
• The death of my beloved childhood chippy – and the startling reason your fish supper will soon cost £10
• How did a woman lie dead behind this door for without a single person noticing?

The judges said Jones’ work was “wonderfully evocative” and that he “makes powerful points while writing with humour”.

Highly commended: Lizzie Parry – The Sun

Highly commended: Sirin Kale – The Guardian

LOCAL JOURNALISM

Jeannette Oldham – BirminghamLive

• Assets frozen, boss banned, accountant bankrupt as ‘fraud’ firm collapses owing taxman £17m
• Homeless Birmingham boss admitted ‘paying for sex with child’ but keeps charity trustee job
• Mystery Digbeth killer may have struck months before at Edgbaston ‘brothel’

The judges said: “This was real foot-in-the door journalism, involving detailed research and then fearless confrontations to shine a light into dark corners of a local community.”

HEALTH AND LIFE SCIENCES JOURNALISM

Rebecca Thomas – The Independent

• Hidden A&E figures revealed as thousands a day forced to wait 12 hours or more
• Can the NHS live with Covid?
• Revealed: Over 600 babies born premature and needing critical care to mothers hospitalised by Covid-19

The judges said: “This was proper revelatory journalism, praised by health professionals and benefiting the public by revealing the true extent of the crisis in hospital A&E departments back in April this year long before it was widely known.”

CRIME AND LEGAL AFFAIRS JOURNALISM

Linly Lin, Stefania Spezzati and Elisa Martinuzzi – Bloomberg News

• Millions in U.K. Covid Loans Went to Inactive or Brand-New Firms
• U.K. Financier’s Firm Aided by Covid Loans Is Ensnared in Probe

The judges said: “This was a blockbuster investigation into massive taxpayer funded fraud which the Government tried to keep secret.”

COMMENT JOURNALISM

Camilla Long – The Sunday Times

• No one drooled over oligarchs like British toffs — I know, because I helped them
• Wagatha Christie trial is a Greek tragedy in fake tan . . . with more swearing
• Poor Bond, a needy old dad trapped in a three-hour ad for phones and Range Rovers

The judges said Long was “one of the must-read writers of the week as her work is “honest, funny and original”.

SPECIALIST JOURNALISM

John Burn-Murdoch – Financial Times

• UK healthcare is already being privatised, but not in the way you think
• Chronic illness makes UK workforce the sickest in developed world
• The NHS is being squeezed in a vice

The judges said Burn-Murdoch’s stories “show how you can use to data to provide fresh insight and news lines,” describing him as a “great communicator who creates powerful narratives”.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS JOURNALISM

Mani Benchelah and Patrick Tombola – Channel 4 Dispatches and Basement Films

• Ukraine: Life Under Attack

The judges said: “These journalists told the story of the battle of Kharkiv better than anyone else. The effectively brought across the fear, anger and grief by telling the story through the eyes of civilians and emergency workers.”

TECHNOLOGY JOURNALISM

Sponsored by Amazon

Harry Davies, Simon Goodley, Felicity Lawrence, Lisa O’Carroll, Rob Davies, Paul Lewis, John Collingridge, Johana Bhuiyan, Rowena Mason, Dan Milmo, James Oliver, Rory Tinman, Nassos Stylianou, Will Dahlgreen, Aisling Gallagher, Becky Dale, Richard Bilton, Andy Head, and Karen Wightman – The Guardian and BBC Panorama

• Uber broke laws, duped police and secretly lobbied governments, leak reveals
• The Uber whistleblower: I’m exposing a system that sold people a lie
• Uber Files: Massive leak reveals how top politicians secretly helped Uber

The judges said: “This was a great scoop which exposed corporate misbehaviour at one of the world’s biggest technology companies.”

BUILT ENVIRONMENT JOURNALISM

Martina Lees – The Sunday Times

• Corner-cutting, cover-ups and a disregard for human life: why Grenfell really happened
• Cladding crisis: ten builders have made more money since Grenfell than their companies pledged for safety works
• No one will pay to fix our unsafe flats — and now we could lose our homes

The judges praised Lees for using the “full force” of The Sunday Times “to crank up the pressure on those responsible for the biggest public housing scandal in 50 years”.

Highly commended: Jack Simpson – Inside Housing

PERSONAL FINANCE JOURNALISM

Richard Butchins, Victoria Noble, David Henshaw, Melanie Quigley, John Pring and Ian Lloyd – Channel 4 Dispatches and Hardcash Productions:

• The Truth about Disability Benefits

The judges said: “This investigation dealt well with a sensitive issue and used robust information and a wide range of sources to bring the story to life.”

Highly commended: Tom Kelly, Miles Dilworth and Victoria Bischoff – Daily Mail

ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT JOURNALISM

Sponsored by Octopus Energy

Simon Evans – Carbon Brief

• Analysis: Cutting the ‘green crap’ has added £2.5bn to UK energy bills
• Analysis: Record-low price for UK offshore wind is nine times cheaper than gas
• Analysis: Why UK energy bills are soaring to record highs – and how to cut them

The judges said: “This journalist is extraordinarily productive and at times has provided a one-person corrective to the prevailing political discourse on energy and the have been proved right.”

Highly commended: Cam Simpson, Akshat Rathi and Saijel Kishan – Bloomberg News

ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALISM

Neil Munshi – Financial Times

• In ‘Touriste’, heroic Russians save the Central African Republic. The truth is even stranger

The judges said: “You just wouldn’t read this anywhere else. A great story with big foreign policy implications.”

NEW JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR

Sponsored by Cardiff University

Noa Hoffman – The Sun

• Tory whip Chris Pincher RESIGNS after ‘groping 2 men’ & claims he ‘drank too much’ – but will remain as an MP
• I woke up in Chris Pincher’s flat to find him on top of me after a night of boozing, alleged victim claims
• Energy giants to hand shareholders £10bn – equivalent of £363 per UK household – as cost of living crisis spirals

The judges praised Hoffman for helping to “bring down a prime minister four days into their job. A public interest scoop which was skilfully landed and swiftly stood up”.

Highly commended: Antonia Cundy – The i/Sunday Times/Guardian

SPORTS JOURNALISM

Ian Herbert – Daily Mail

• We demand to know why they died: Scandal of the young Qatar World Cup workers who never came home
• Qatar could ‘rent’ noisy fans to get behind hosts, 4,000 supporters will stay in ‘floating hotels’ while immigrant construction workers must leave… Sportsmail reveals what the 2022 World Cup will really be like
• The failings of the football factories

The judges said: “This was high class journalism investing time and money effectively shine a light on some of the dark secrets behind the world of sport.”

CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR

Sponsored by Newsworks

Transparency in British public life – openDemocracy

The judges said: “This campaign matters hugely for British journalism and encourages other journalists to fight freedom of information battles.”

Highly commended: A scandal worse than thalidomide – The Sunday Times

PHOTOJOURNALISM

Ed Ram – The Guardian

• Worshippers visit the Trapezna Church in Kyiv.

The judges felt that amid some outstanding entries from Ukraine, Ram “stood out for the compassion and artistry which he brought to covering the impact of war”.

INTERVIEWER OF THE YEAR

Alice Thomson – The Times

• Tony Blair: ‘Voters don’t want a situation where women can’t talk about being women’
• Deborah James: ‘I want to die listening to my family, I want to hear the normal buzz of life as I go’
• Bill Gates: ‘I’m grieving the same way Melinda is’

The judges said Thomson “secures incredible access and lets subjects speak in their own voice whilst also asking the tough questions and obtaining good news lines”.

Highly commended: Josh Glancy – The Sunday Times

Highly commended: Stephen Wright – Daily Mail

POLITICS JOURNALISM

Pippa Crerar – The Mirror

• EXCLUSIVE: Boris Johnson ‘broke Covid lockdown rules’ with Downing Street parties at Xmas
• EXCLUSIVE: Boris Johnson’s ‘wine time Fridays’ – No10 staff held drinks EVERY week during pandemic
• EXCLUSIVE: Boris Johnson and wife Carrie to host lavish Chequers wedding party while he clings on

The judges said Crerar “was the journalist who first brought Partygate to the public eye and continued to do so exposing hypocrisy and dishonesty at the heart of government along the way”.

They also chose to highly commend two other journalists for their work on Partygate as each of their entries “demonstrated huge public interest and had the wow factor”.

Highly commended: Mishal Husain, Justin Webb, Nick Robinson, Owenna Griffiths and Ione Wells – BBC Radio 4 Today Programme

Highly commended: Paul Brand, Imogen Barrer and Nathan Lee – ITV News

BUSINESS, FINANCE AND ECONOMICS JOURNALISM

Sponsored by Starling Bank

James Oliver, Steve Swann, Nassos Stylianou and Will Dahlgreen – BBC News/Panorama

• Alisher Usmanov: Oligarch says he ditched mansions before sanctions
• Hidden wealth of one of Putin’s ‘inner circle’ revealed
• Banned Russian oligarchs exploited UK secrecy loophole

The judges said: “This journalism expertly exposed how the UK Government opened the door to Russian oligarchs and then allowed them to evade sanctions imposed following the invasion of Ukraine.”

TRAVEL JOURNALISM

Simon Calder – The Independent

• Foreign Office finally updates passport advice after passengers to EU wrongly turned away
• P&O Ferries defends brutal sacking of 800 staff
• Liz Truss flew by private jet to Australia at cost of £500,000 to taxpayers

The judges described Calder as “a fantastic consumer champion who led the way on all the big travel stories over the last year”.

INVESTIGATION OF THE YEAR

Susie Coen – Daily Mail

• Smart Motorways Horrors Exposed

The judges said: “This gruelling investigation led to the government scrapping a hugely expensive and deadly transport initiative. It was an investigation which was praised by the Transport Secretary himself who said it would undoubtedly save lives.”

SCOOP OF THE YEAR

Downing Street partied as Queen and country mourned death of Prince Philip – Daily Telegraph

The judges said: “In a year when there were so many jaw-dropping revelations which was the revelation which, more than any other, caused our judges to choke on the cornflakes. It was the single story which probably did the most to change public opinion about the activities of the prime minister.”

INNOVATION OF THE YEAR

Sponsored by Google News Initiative

Eco-Bot.Net

The judges said: “Genuinely innovative, this project combined data-scraping, AI and expert journalism and design to expose misinformation on social media.”

NEWS PROVIDER OF THE YEAR

Sky News

The judges said Sky News “has a brave record when it comes to chronicling the wars of the 21st century and Ukraine has been no exception.

“It has had correspondents in Ukraine for every day of the conflict and secured a memorable first exclusive interview with President Zelensky when it seemed that Kyiv was soon to fall.

“It has also led the way on coverage of the cost of living crisis, Partygate and climate.”

PUBLIC SERVICE JOURNALISM

Sponsored by the Journalists’ Charity

Journalists for UK media in Ukraine

This year’s public service award does not go to a single journalist or even a single news organisation, but to a group that has done more than any other to serve the public interest this year not just in the UK but worldwide.

The award was accepted by BBC Ukraine presenter Olga Malchevska on behalf of the hundreds of journalists who have risked their lives reporting from the country this year.

MARIE COLVIN AWARD

Antonia Cundy – Financial Times

The judges said: “What impressed was the quality of her writing, and the fact that, as a freelance, she had the gumption to get herself to Ukraine and stay there. She found good, original stories, including reporting on corruption in aid delivery and her grisly piece on the dead Russian soldiers shows the lengths to which she will go to get the story. Her work is very much in Marie’s tradition of determination and grit as well as humanity.”

Highly commended: Shefali Rafiq – Kashmiri photojournalist

JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR

Sponsored by Camelot

Pippa Crerar – The Mirror

The judges said that this year Crerar “did more than any other to hold our political leadership to account in the face of denials and outright dishonesty”.

She broke the first Partygate exclusive and went on to make series of revelations ranging from wine time Fridays to complaints about late night revelling at Number 10 at a time when the rest of the country was in Government mandated lockdown.

Her work was met with multiple denials from everyone up to the PM himself only for every detail to be confirmed in Sue Gray’s official report.

GEORGINA HENRY PRIZE

In association with Women in Journalism and sponsored by Wiggin

Kate Samuelson – Cheapskate

The judges said Samuelson, who will receive a £4,000 prize, “has a proven track record with a long-running project, which perfectly understands its audience and has a slick and vibrant execution” – and they appreciated its potential to bring joy during the current cost of living crisis.

WOMAN OF THE YEAR

In association with Women in Journalism and sponsored by Cision

Pippa Crerar – The Guardian, formerly of The Mirror

The judges felt Crerar’s reporting on Partygate was “a vindication for the timeless skills of contact building, earning trust of sources and being relentless in pursuit of a scoop which revealed wrongdoing in the seat of power”.

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